Esmonde and Larbey were a British television comedy scriptwriting duo from the 1960s to the 1990s, creating popular situation comedies such as Please Sir! and The Good Life. Bob Larbey was born in Clapham, South London, on 26 June 1934 and made his writing debut for BBC radio, before contributing a film adaptation, Mrs Silly, starring Maggie Smith. Larbey met his future writing partner when they were pupils at the Henry Thornton School. John Esmonde served a couple of years in the Royal Air Force in Air Ambulance before realising that his budding writing partnership with Larbey might prove more fruitful. They began to have sketches accepted on shows such as I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again and The Dick Emery Show. Esmonde was married to Georgina Barton from 1960 until his death in August 2008, aged 71. Their first sitcom as a writing team came in 1966 with Room At The Bottom for the BBC. This followed the exploits of a group of maintenance men working for Saracens Manufacturing Company. Starting out as a pilot in the BBC's Comedy Playhouse programme, it lasted for one series the next year, starring Kenneth Connor, Deryck Guyler and Francis Matthews. Wikipedia [ - ]

Esmonde and Larbey were a British television comedy scriptwriting duo from the 1960s to the... [ + ]